How to breath before a hold-down and between waves.

[zacksc]

Try running 200 yards at 85% of your maximum effort, and then immediately try holding your breath. It is scary how hard it is to last even a few seconds. You'll see then that the trick to holding your breath is not to exert yourself in the impact zone, or indeed, even before you wipe out. Try to conserve energy and relax at all times, not just when you wipe out. Keep plenty in reserve.

Right. I see what you mean. I think that is when I get in trouble is when I exert myself thinking I can just make it over and get caught inside at the last second after a sprint.

[DavidJohn]

Another option.. I'm sure these will get even smaller.. http://www.spareair.com

I've almost drowned a few times in 10'-20' waves [and bigger] and wish I had one then.

[zacksc]

Does anyone know of a specific web site, book or other resource that they feel is good for teaching deep breathing? Although a lot of stuff comes up in searches, I haven't found anything that I thought was really good for an older person to learn better breathing techniques.

[PonoBill]

Spareair is a problem. Breathing compressed air fifteen feet down means an embolism if you don't blow out on the way up.

[PonoBill]

I have a terrible habit of holding my breath while I'm surfing a big wave. My solution is that I whistle. Works for me.

[surfinJ]

Try running 200 yards at 85% of your maximum effort, and then immediately try holding your breath. It is scary how hard it is to last even a few seconds. You'll see then that the trick to holding your breath is not to exert yourself in the impact zone, or indeed, even before you wipe out. Try to conserve energy and relax at all times, not just when you wipe out. Keep plenty in reserve.

This is the main obstacle to breath control during a heavy beating, the elevated pulse. Remaining calm is key but it is a mental tool. Do to the physical effort before the initial fall/dive our pulse rate is up consuming oxygen.

The spare air is dangerous for stated reasons due to the pressure zones in the impact area.

Hopefully this year or next the inflation vests now being used by pros will become available to the public.
Right. I see what you mean. I think that is when I get in trouble is when I exert myself thinking I can just make it over and get caught inside at the last second after a sprint.

[surfcowboy]

Ok, trying again.

Adam Freediver is a YouTube channel with lots of videos on breath holding.

"Freediving - The Essentials for Reaching 65 feet In Just Two Days" is a cheap Kindle book on this.

Breathology has good videos and articles.

See the trend? Freedivers can teach you what you seek. This is why the big wave guys do it.

[ninja tuna]

I just took a freediving course and I only see a few things that could help.  The primary one would be learning to stretch your diaphragm more in order to take a bigger breath.  That would allow you to pull in a little more air in a big short breath.  Freediving and surfing/SUS are different in several ways.

SUS, continuous moving keeping heart rate high-- freediving, relaxing and bringing your heart rate down.

SUS, wipeoout , outside set, caught inside is one big breath to hold til it is over.--freediving, building up to your breath hold/dive by relaxing and breathing a certain way that i do not see possible while moving around trying to catch waves and by continuing to dive progressively deeper each time.

SUS, don't know when you will need to hold your breath at a certain time--freediving, i know when I will dive deep or hold my breath so I take minutes to prepare for it.

Diaphragm breathing like Pono said is probably one of the easiest ways to improve your breath hold. Or known as crodile breathing. Lay on your stomach and breath thru your diaphragm which should raise your back. You will look like a crocodile.  Or lay on you back with your hand on your stomach. You should feel your hand go up.  Most people breath with the chest and shoulders going up which is incorrect and you do not take in as much air.

You could literally make a fatal mistake trying freediving breathing techniques in water even if you are with some one. Because you and the other person are not trained to handle what could happen.  For statistics, 90% happen after the person surfaces, takes 2 - 3 breathes and tells someone they are ok. Another 9% from 15 feet to the surface. So yes 99% are 15 feet and shallower.

[PonoBill]

All true, Ninja. I think the major thing freediving can offer surfers is how to fill their lungs with as much fresh air as possible. Most of the breathing people do when they haven't practiced is shallow, and it moves the same air up and down the trachea and leaves a lot of depleted air in the lungs. The panicky out of breath feeling doesn't stem from a lack of oxygen, it comes from high CO2 concentration. You can breathe pure nitrogen or any non-reactive gas and just pass out and die without ever feeling out of breath. If you start holding your breath with somewhat depleted air you're going to feel a need to breathe right away. Freedivers learn to manage this feeling, but they also start with a lungful of undepleted air--or at least as much so as is physically possible.

[digger71]

Here is a good example of a guy who can hold his breath for 5+ minutes (in ideal conditions) preparing to spend a long time underwater in a really bad spot.  Scraping like hell to possibly get over the wave while at the same time breathing in way to survive a long hold down.

[surfcowboy]

NInja, good points but Pono you called it. I was thinking how I learned 2 major things (other than how you can black out lol) from freediving study.

Breathing from your diaphragm and yes, controlling that panic' feeling when you start to feel out of breath (spoiler alert, you're not out of breath when you start feeling that convulsion) and relaxing rather than panicking when it hits. As many have said, you don't need 5 minutes, but you might need to hold your breath through an extra uncomfortable 10 seconds.

Wasn't offering that you should breath up or relax on your board.

Besides, if you learn a bit you get another cool thing to do when it's flat. I'll be having a ball with a mask, snorkel, and fins next week in Catalina!

[zacksc]

Thanks for all that.  I really appreciate it and I will use those free diving links cowboy.
Ninja, awesome contextualization and analysis. Really helpful.
Thank you!

[zacksc]

And thank you PonoBill.  I am starting to learn diaphragmatic breathing. The surprising thing to me is that when you first start, the diaphragmatic breaths you can take are pretty small (not much air flowing). But I think that by doing that you are building diaphragm strength which eventually leads to deeper breathing, and also improves core strength and posture. Does that make sense?

[PonoBill]

The simplest form is the one I use--a rolling breath. Exhale, and at the end of the exhale focus on pushing your diaphragm up, pulling your belly in. The first few times you try this you will inhale. Work at it until it's an exhale. Then reverse the motion for an inhale, pushing your belly out and your diaphragm down, then rolling the inhalation up to your chest. Reverse to an exhale. With a few sessions of practice over a few days, you can do it almost automatically. Some people work at doing it all the time, and their breath rate becomes pretty slow. I credit the practice with eliminating my asthma. My doc says 50% better breathing, 50% his great doctoring. If I breathe normally to calibrate a breath test and then do the diaphragmatic breathing for the test I score about 110 percent, where I previously scored 80-90% capacity.

I started doing it for the same reason you are--more time to get back to the surface. The other benefits are icing on the cake, but I like icing.

[zacksc]

Right on. Thanks PonoBill. I'll keep practicing. I was thinking of getting a small portable spirometer to see how I am doing, but maybe that is going overboard. I am not sure. Have you ever tried one of those? (like from Air Smart).